Brownstein: A Tribute To Filmmaker Martin Duckworth’s Wife And Love

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Martin Duckworth is among the most revered filmmakers in the country. And among the most private.

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Winner of the Prix Albert-Tessier 2015, the highest cinematographic honor bestowed in Quebec, the Montreal native has dedicated his career to social activism, having made and filmed dozens of documentaries, he has lost count of how many, around the world and playing in everything from war and political upheaval to racism, feminism, the environment, and even professional sports.

Though still alive and lucid at 88, Duckworth decided to take a break from movies about five years ago and focus on caring for his partner of nearly 50 years, Audrey Schirmer, who suffered from Alzheimer’s disease. Schirmer, an acclaimed visual artist who started the photography department at the Saidye Bronfman Center, died nearly two years ago.

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Jeremiah Hayes’ documentary Dear Audrey is a poignant chronicle of Schirmer’s struggle and Duckworth’s challenge in caring for her and her autistic daughter Jacqueline full time. The film, co-produced by Cineflix Media and the NFB, will have its world premiere on Friday at Cinéma du Musée alongside the Rencontres internationales du documentaire de Montréal. It will also be available on the festival website from November 22-25, hitting theaters in May.

Duckworth’s success as a filmmaker has always been due to his low-key, wall-flying approach, exploring stories and people in a way that reveals a lot, but without revealing much about himself.

Full disclosure: I did two papers with Duckworth as cinematographer several decades ago. As talented, innovative, and quirky as he was, I learned more about him in the 90 minutes of Dear Audrey than in the nearly two years I spent with him across the continent, as well as continuing correspondence with him for decades to come.

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Who would say that Duckworth was a classical piano genius or a hardened runner, still wearing the most inappropriate and inappropriate attire imaginable? It’s safe to say that few knew about her family background or her previous, often complex relationships and her many children and grandchildren.

Dear Audrey is the kind of story, uplifting but never maudlin, that would have caught Duckworth’s attention, as long as he wasn’t one of its main leads.

“I’ve always been uncomfortable talking about myself, but I did it only because it was a tribute to Audrey and my love for her,” says a quiet Duckworth in the artistically cluttered Plateau home where he has lived for 40 years. “Alzheimer’s is such a terrible and debilitating disease that it robs one of all dignity.”

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It helped that Principal Hayes was a good friend and particularly sensitive to the situation. Otherwise the doc would never have happened.

“I never felt like (Hayes) was spinning around as a filmmaker, but rather was spinning around like an old friend. Without imposing himself, he observed and really captured the essence of what we were going through, not only with what Audrey was going through, but also with everything that Jacqueline was going through with her mother’s illness and her impending death. “

Hayes says, “It was really a labor of love.”

Hayes behaved the same way Duckworth would have, with as small a crew as possible. But it was a fair amount of work: In addition to directing, Hayes wrote, co-produced, edited, and provided the cinematography and on-location sound.

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“To be honest, I didn’t know most of Martin’s stories either,” says Hayes, perhaps best known as the co-director, co-writer and editor of Reel Injun, for which he won the 2010 Gemini award for best. direction in a documentary. “I first worked with him in the early ’90s, but these were stories he told me after we started shooting.”

The idea of ​​doing something involving Duckworth occurred to Hayes five years ago.

“I was really excited about the idea, because I thought he was such a colorful, amazing character and a role model,” recalls Hayes. “And I also thought it would be fascinating to talk about how I was dealing with Audrey’s illness. But when I first asked him if it would be okay to make a movie, he said, ‘No. I have nothing important to say. ‘ That’s the kind of humble man he is. “

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So Hayes took another approach. One day while visiting, he caught Duckworth playing the piano for Audrey and asked if he could just film that scene. Duckworth relented.

“The scene really worked for him. He never said no after that time. Every time I asked him if he could film a scene, he agreed. I just took it step by step. So I felt like he wanted me to keep shooting. “

Hayes ended up filming once or twice a month for more than four years.

“I never wanted to stay longer than expected, but I was always welcome. I just wanted my footprint as a filmmaker to be as small as possible. “

Precisely the same modus operandi as its theme.

TAKE A LOOK

Dear audrey will be screened with French subtitles on Friday, November 19 at 6 pm at Cinéma du Musée, 1379-A Sherbrooke St. W., as part of the Rencontres internationales du documentaire de Montréal. It will also be available to view at ridm.ca from November 22 to 25.

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